


Not Egg-sactly What You Wished For

by leveragehunters (Monkeygreen)



Series: If Wishing Made It So [5]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Genie/Djinn, Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Dragons, Fluff, Foster Mom Steve Rogers, M/M, Non-Serum Steve Rogers/Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes | Shrinkyclinks, Originally Posted on Tumblr, genie Bucky Barnes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-19
Updated: 2018-02-19
Packaged: 2019-03-20 17:31:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13722600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Monkeygreen/pseuds/leveragehunters
Summary: "How did you end up with a dragon?" Bucky asked, but he was already kneeling beside Steve, touching gentle fingers to the dragon's side, the glow of golden magic washing over the red-tinted scales as it tried to fix what was broken. The dragon sighed with relief, lying less like an overcooked noodle in Steve's arms."It just appeared at the window.""And you let her in?""Her?""Her," Bucky confirmed."Yeah, Bucky. She needed help. I wasn't gonna leave her out there."Suddenly the dragon heaved herself over, long neck curved, sides rippling, red intensifying until it was almost glowing, there was a moment of strain, the dragon's body tense as steel cable, and then there was an egg in Steve's lap.





	Not Egg-sactly What You Wished For

**Author's Note:**

> Prompted by Galwednesday from a Tumblr post about a chicken laying her egg in a kid's lap, blatantly encouraged by Aggressivewhenstartled (and I thank them both most heartily!), and suddenly there was this.

The sound had been going on for at least a few minutes before Steve became consciously aware of it. To be fair, though, frantic scratching at the window of their apartment wasn't exactly something he was expecting. They were up way too high for a cat, or a dog, or even a human, given there was no convenient fire-escape to clamber up.

But clambering wasn't required when you had wings.

The noise finally grew loud enough, desperate enough, that it pulled Steve's attention away from his tablet and he turned to stare at the window.

Even after all this time, even after everything, after Bucky and magic and being so in love with a genie that even now he sometimes couldn't breathe with it, he still had trouble registering that there was a dark green dragon with a vibrant red belly outside the window, its wings beating the air, staring pleadingly at him.

It was around the size of a Labrador, and when it saw him watching its claws scraped the glass and it pressed its head against the window. Steve didn't speak dragon, wasn't familiar with lizard body language, but some things transcended speech, transcended species. It was begging to be let in. It was asking for help.

Steve didn't hesitate, leaping out of his chair to open the window and it half-collapsed into his arms, exhausted, and Steve hit the floor, cradling it. "Bucky!" He had no idea where Bucky was, if he was in the city or in this dimension, but he knew Bucky would always answer his call. Seconds later a golden-eyed, one-armed genie appeared beside him, ready to fight.

"There's something wrong with it," he said, staring up at Bucky.

"How did you end up with a _dragon_?" Bucky asked, but he was already kneeling beside Steve, touching gentle fingers to the dragon's side, the glow of golden magic washing over the red-tinted scales as it tried to fix what was broken. The dragon sighed with relief, lying less like an overcooked noodle in Steve's arms.

"It just appeared at the window."

"And you let her in?"

"Her?"

"Her," Bucky confirmed.

"Yeah, Bucky. She needed help. I wasn't gonna leave her out there."

Bucky grumbled, but he leaned into Steve, brushing their shoulders together.

"Can you talk to her?"

"No." Suddenly the dragon heaved herself over, long neck curved, sides rippling, red intensifying until it was almost glowing, there was a moment of strain, the dragon's body tense as steel cable, and then there was an egg in Steve's lap.

Both he and Bucky were struck speechless as the dragon curved over herself to nose the egg, tucking it into the fold of Steve's knee, then she was clambering off to crouch in front of him.

The dragon's eyes met his, green as emeralds and deep as the ocean, and they reminded him of Bucky's: beautiful, intelligent, but nothing even close to human looked back. There was a question there, and a panicked franticness. "I'll keep it safe," he found himself promising. "Whatever you need to do, go. We won't let anything happen to it. I give you my word."

Bucky's hand slid over his shoulder, his magic flowing down Steve's chest in a golden river, lending a genie's power to a human's promise. The dragon's eyes flashed, she spread her wings, touched her egg with gentle claws, then tore herself away and launched herself out the window.

Steve stared after her.

"I'm hoping you know how to incubate a dragon's egg," he said faintly, curling his fingers protectively around the soft-shelled iridescent oval.

"They're tough," Bucky said. "Making promises to dragons. Steve. You need to be _careful_."

Steve turned to face Bucky, whose golden eyes were shimmering inches from his own. "What was I supposed to do? She came here for a reason. I don't know what could drive her away from her baby, but it must have been important. What else could I do?"

Bucky touched Steve's chin with the tip of his index finger, then gently kissed him. "Nothing. Not and still be you."

 

* * *

 

Dragon eggs were _very_ tough. Over the next few hours the shell hardened to something that felt and looked like marble. Bucky swathed it in a cradle of magic, but even without that, Steve wasn't sure anything could hurt it. Which was probably just as well, since he wasn't willing to leave it on its own.

Tough as it was, since Bucky couldn't swear that the cold and nothingness of the momentary inbetween of his method of travel wouldn't hurt it, Steve was back to taking the bus when he needed to go somewhere. Bucky, with a deeply pained look, joined him, the dragon egg wrapped in old shirts and tucked into a small cooler bag that sat on the seat between them.

Steve started talking to the egg, since he'd heard somewhere that human babies in the womb could hear their parents talking. He read it stories of dragons. Not soft stories, where the dragons were friends to humans, or servants to humans, or slaves to humans. No, he read it bloody stories, where the dragons were wild and free and far more likely to make a meal out of humans as invite one to ride on their backs.

"Why those ones?" Bucky asked curiously.

"She trusted me with her egg. She trusted me with her baby. I don't know if it can understand me, hell, I don't even know if it can hear me, but if it can, it's gonna hatch knowing it's a dragon. Something magical, something amazing, not some kind of scaly human lapdog." He didn't look at Bucky as he said it, but he threaded his fingers through Bucky's and held on hard. "It's gonna grow up knowing its free."

Bucky didn't reply, not in words, but he pulled Steve close, tucked him under his chin, and when he disappeared the next day, he returned with an ancient book, magic the only thing keeping it in one piece. It held dragon stories—not ones written by humans, even if they'd been the ones to put them to parchment, but stories that came from the dragons themselves.

They were curled together on the couch, Steve tucked under Bucky's arm, Bucky running his fingers through Steve's hair, the egg sitting in its cradle of protective magic while Steve read to it—Bucky's magic granting him the gift of a language so old it had been lost to humans entirely—when the egg began to crack.

"Steve," was all Bucky had time to say, because the cracks turned into fractures, turned into an explosion as Bucky let his magic go and suddenly there was a pale green sprawl of baby dragon draped across their thighs, mostly made up of wing and tail, staring up at them suspiciously.

Neither of them spoke, not wanting to scare it, and it scrambled backwards, down their legs, tiny claws pinpricking as it tried to get away. It was too new, too clumsy, and its claws tangled in its wings, its tail tangled in its claws, and it wound up in a ball, caterwauling in distress. Steve couldn't stop himself from saying, "Hey, you're not hurt, you don't need to be scared, it's fine."

At the sound of Steve's voice, it stopped, tilting its head back and forth, and as Steve started talking a stream of soothing nonsense, cautiously reaching for it, it shook itself free, scrambled towards him, and shoved its head under Steve's armpit.

"I guess all that story-telling paid off," Steve said, carefully straightening its wings.

Bucky smiled and kissed his temple. "Baby dragons are born starving. I might need to magic up that cow after all."

"It's smaller than a cat. Do _not_ magic up a cow."

Bucky regarded the tiny dragon thoughtfully. "A quarter of a cow."

Steve mock-glared at him and Bucky grinned.

Bucky didn't magic up any fraction of a cow, but the tiny dragon sat on their kitchen counter and ate what Steve thought had to be close to several chickens worth of meat before it suddenly fell asleep, stomach bulging, and didn't move. If it hadn't been for the rise and fall of its chest, he would have thought it was dead.

"Okay, so we've got a baby dragon," Steve said in something approaching wonder.

"It looks that way."

"Any ideas?"

Bucky tapped his chin thoughtfully. "Don't leave the windows open." Steve's eyes went wide with worry and Bucky laughed softly, making Steve swat him. "We won't let him escape."

"Him?"

"Yeah, Steve. He’s a boy."

Gently, Steve ran his finger across the soft nubs above the dragon's eyes, which were firmly closed as he slept on the counter. "Welcome to the world, little guy."

 

* * *

 

The little guy grew fast, scarfing down meat and bits of bone, turning up his nose at anything even remotely resembling a vegetable. Steve had no idea whether or not to be worried and even Bucky, for all that he was a genie, the very definition of powerful, had no idea if it was a problem. He _would_ eat apple and watermelon, so they did their best to make sure he got a decent amount of both and hoped for the best.

They didn't name him. They were holding him on trust and he wasn't theirs to name.

When he was three weeks old, he launched himself off the kitchen counter and flew around the living room, ending up perched on top of the shelves above Steve's desk, looking smug. Steve laughed and said, "Good job. Think you can make it back?"

The baby dragon tilted his head like he could understand, and more and more Steve was certain he could, then launched himself off, wings flapping, and aimed straight for Steve. Steve gulped, but held out his hands, the dragon folded his wings and half-plummeted the last few inches into Steve's arms, where he rolled over, sighed once, went limp and closed his eyes. "Comfy?" He opened one eye, snorted, and closed it again. Steve laughed and hiked him higher, which got him a discontented grumble that reminded him of Bucky.

Their apartment was too small for a baby dragon that was starting to spread his wings. Bucky solved the problem by making it bigger on the inside. Way back at the beginning, Steve had objected for himself, compromising by letting Bucky carve out extra space for Steve's studio; he couldn't bring himself to object for the dragon, so now they had high ceilings and walls that stretched far wider than the physical confines of the building itself.

Bucky was so pleased with himself, seemed so happy to have made the change, Steve wondered why he'd objected to strongly in the first place. While the baby dragon soared in circles high above them, he caught Bucky's face in both hands and kissed him, thoroughly, sweetly, until Bucky was dazed, his hand clutching Steve's hip. "I love you," Steve told him, and Bucky lit up from the inside, golden eyes glowing.

 

* * *

 

The weeks passed, turning into another month, and Steve sat at the table, the baby dragon sitting in front of him, head cocked as Steve fed him bits of what he thought might be rabbit. "What do we do," he asked Bucky. "If she doesn’t come back soon? Can you find her?"

"Maybe." Bucky was watching Steve, his eyes a deep gold, and Steve knew he heard what Steve wasn't willing to say: what if she doesn't come back at all? What if she couldn’t? "Dragons have their own magic. She could be on any plane."

"Can we find his… He must have family." Steve looked at Bucky while the dragon nudged his fingers, gnawing on them gently, wings buffeting the air. "He should be learning to be a _dragon_."

"I know."

"I'm worried about her."

"I know."

The baby dragon crawled off the table, flopped into Steve's lap and, belly full, promptly fell asleep. "I'm worried about him."

"I know." Bucky's voice was soft. "But you, Steve." Bucky stood and walked around the table to stand next to Steve, sliding his fingers through his hair. Steve tipped his head back to look at him. There was a faint smile playing across Bucky's face. "Give any other human a dragon, they'd be plotting how to keep it. You just want to get him home. She knew he'd be safe with you."

Steve huffed and shook his head, but Bucky curled his fingers around Steve's jaw, holding him in place, and bent down to kiss him deeply. Steve sighed and gave himself over to it.

 

* * *

 

Another three weeks passed, the baby dragon's pale green scales starting to darken into an emerald green the colour of his mother's eyes, and they'd tentatively made plans for Bucky to go looking for her. He had no idea where to start. He'd tried to explain it to Steve—a specific grain of sand at the bottom of the ocean, but the ocean is a million oceans and the grain of sand is one of infinite grains of sand and you don't know which grain is in which ocean, and that's actually nothing like what it's like, because that would be easy compared to this—but he was going to try.

They had to at least try, even if they knew it wouldn’t work.

And then they didn't even have to try, because a scratching at the window sent the baby dragon hurling himself at the glass and only Bucky's magic, wrapped around him faster than thought, cushioned his impact. He started peeping, tiny distressed noises, and Steve leapt out of his chair, running for the window.

Hovering outside, wings buffeting the air, was the green dragon. Steve threw open the window and stepped out of the away, and she flew through to land on the floor, followed by a second dragon, this one deep blue, fading to purple at legs and tail.

They both looked more than a little worse for wear, the green dragon missing scales on her neck, a deep scar on her head, just missing her right eye, and there was a toe gone from her left front foot. The tip of the blue dragon's tail had been severed and there were ragged tears in its wings.

The baby dragon hurled himself at his mother and she trilled, soft and relieved, and folded her wings over him. The blue dragon did the same, nosing him all over, making sure he was safe, he was whole.

"Dad?" Steve asked as Bucky wrapped his arm around Steve's shoulders.

"Mother," Bucky said. "They're both his mothers."

Steve watched a family reuniting, eyes travelling over the damage that had been done to the green dragon, to the blue. "She went to rescue her," he paused, not sure what the right word was for a pair of dragons, and went with, "her wife." He turned to look at Bucky. "Didn't she?"

"I think so."

"We would have helped," Steve murmured. "If she'd asked, if we'd known, we would have helped."

"She needed you for something more important." The green dragon lifted her head to meet Steve's eyes and, clearly, deliberately, she nodded. It woke something fierce in his heart, something hot and warm, that she'd trusted him to care for her child, even knowing—and however faint, looking at her healed injuries, it must have been a possibility—that she might not come back.

The baby dragon, with a quick look at his mothers, scampered over to Steve and Steve crouched down. "Bye, little guy. Don't forget you're a dragon. Never forget that." The baby dragon bumped Steve's nose with his head, gnawed on it, needle teeth sharp but he didn't break skin, then ran back, the blue curving her neck protectively over him. "And if you need us," Steve said to all of them as he straightened. "You know where to find us."

Wings stretched and fluttered, they beat the air, and then all three dragons were taking flight, disappearing out the window and into the sky. Steve stared after them until they were gone, Bucky's hand sliding around the back of his neck, warm and solid.  

"I'm glad she was okay." Steve leaned into him. "But I'm gonna miss him," he admitted on a whisper.

"I know. It's okay to miss him." They watched the sky, then Bucky pulled him close, wrapped his arm around his waist, and Steve turned into him and hugged him.

"Is this just going to happen now?" he asked, rubbing his nose against the hollow of Bucky's throat.

"Is what going to happen now?"

"Dragons. Ghost pirates. Who knows what else. I don't mind, it's _good_ to make a difference, it'd just be nice to know."

"You bought the cursed ring." Bucky leaned back a little to grin at him. "It didn't show up out of nowhere."

"Point."

"As for the dragon." Bucky's eye were molten gold and Steve was caught, Bucky's fingers trailing across his cheek to cradle his jaw. "She must have seen you could be trusted with a genie. And a human you can trust with a genie," he brushed the lightest kiss across Steve's mouth, "they can be trusted with anything."


End file.
